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AHL San Diego Gulls

Gulls Withstand Barracuda Charge, 4-2

January 19, 2022 - American Hockey League (AHL)
San Diego Gulls News Release


The San Diego Gulls defeated the San Jose Barracuda 4-2 tonight at SAP Center to improve to 5-1-0-0 against their Pacific Division rival this season and have won eight of their last nine meetings with the Barracuda overall. The Gulls have now earned standings points in four of their first five contests to begin the 2022 calendar year (3-1-1-0).

Benoit-Olivier Groulx earned his first multi-point effort of the season with 1-1=2 points and led all skaters with a career high +3 rating. Groulx's two-point night gives him points in each of his last three AHL contests (3-1=4) to match his career-high point streak.

Trevor Carrick scored his third goal of the season at 5:35 of the second period, marking goals in consecutive games for the first time as a Gull. Carrick has collected 2-1=3 points over his last two games.

Alex Limoges collected his second career game-winning goal, breaking a 2-2 tie with 16:21 left in the third period. Limoges has goals in back-to-back games for this first time this season.

Bryce Kindopp netted his fourth goal of the season and now has four points in his last five games (2-2=4).

Hunter Drew, Lucas Elvenes and Greg Printz each earned assists. Drew has tallied 3-1=4 points in his last four games while Elvenes has recorded 1-1=2 points in his first three games with the Gulls.

Francis Marotte stopped a career high 38-of-40 shots for his second straight victory and has backstopped the Gulls to standings points in three of his first four AHL starts (2-1-1-0).

The Gulls continue their four-game road trip tomorrow, Jan. 19 against the Stockton Heat at Stockton Arena (6:30 p.m.).

POSTGAME QUOTES

San Diego Gulls

Assistant Coach Daniel Jacob

On the penalty kill in the third period:

I felt we needed a timeout here on the first five-on-three (penalty kill). We looked lost a little bit, so I just wanted to make sure that everybody would be on the same page. Yeah, they responded really well. Frankie (Marotte) in net made some big saves, but I thought the structure was good. And we didn't give them so many good looks. I think it gave us a lot of momentum to finish the game on the right note.

On the young players contributing offensively:

It's fun to see. They get rewarded. They had a good stretch the last few games. They have a really good opportunity to play, to log some minutes. For them it's really to do it shift in and shift out the right way. Like I said, we had a slow start as a team, they were part of it, but we found our legs as the game went on. It's always fun to see guys get rewarded for some hard plays.

On Francis Marotte:

He's been better from game-to-game. He's been listening to Jeff Glass, he's been huge. He came in last minute. It went really fast for him, but he's been adjusting well. What we see from him is his timely saves. At crucial moments we're going to have some breakdowns, it's going to happen, and the way he reacts to it and he gives us a chance to stay in the game and take the game over.

On staying out of the penalty box against Stockton tomorrow:

Definitely. They have a really good power play. They have a really good team overall, older team, mature team. So we need to make sure we stay out of the box. We'll discuss that, we'll address that and make sure it doesn't happen. But at the same time we want to make sure that we play hard within our structure. So we need to walk that line.

Benoit-Olivier Groulx

On what was said in the locker room between the first and second periods:

We had a slow start. We were kind of surprised by their speed a bit, especially on the forecheck. They were coming really hard at us and we couldn't find a solution in the first period, but we're a team with a lot of character and a lot of different players that can do the job. When we regrouped after the first period, we just said 'we're good, we've just got to play our way- like chips pucks in, like go to the net.' We've got to get them tired a bit and now it's going to create some space and that's what happened. We put a lot of pucks at the net, we were finishing all of our checks and that opened up a ton of space for us.

On the 5-on-3 penalties the team killed:

Frankie (Francis Marotte) honestly made some great saves on the 5-on-3. They were moving the puck a lot. I was expecting a bit more shots from them from the up top, but it was good for us- especially the shots from the side. Frankie's got them all day and he's been good all game long and all the guys that played pk today played really well. It was a huge part of our game today so we've got to keep that going for tomorrow.

On Alex Limoges' game-winning goal:

Me and Limo (Alex Limoges) talked a lot, especially at the start of the season when he wasn't getting the points that he wanted to have and Limo's a great player. He's really, really creative offensively. He's going to find out the open spots out there and I think today he showed that. He played a great game. His goal is terrific, he had a lot of poise, he figured [out the] goalie, went around him and just put it in so I thought that was good. It showed a lot of confidence from him and a lot of poise so I'm really happy to see him back doing the stuff that he was doing last year.

On the key to beating Stockton tomorrow:

It's going to be a tough game. I remember the first two games we played against Stockton. It was a fast-paced game. Obviously, they have one of the best teams in the league, if not the best team so we're going to have to be prepared. We need a better start than we had today, but I think we're ready. We had a great game against them at home last time o I think if we do that again, we're going to be fine.

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